Embodied Knowledge

EMBODIED KNOWLEDGE

Embodied knowledge, also referred to as tacit intelligence, is experience gained and contained in physical rather than mental form. As Jennifer Roberts writes in her article, “Things, Material Turn, Transnational Turn,” “[...] the knowledge of how to make something is partially stored in the body, out of reach of abstract thinking or verbal communication, and is best transmitted through practice and imitation; it cannot be fully captured in instruction manuals or pattern books.” Examples of embodied knowledge include: the respective level of pressure it takes to chisel or carve different types of wood or score a piece of glass; the capacity to measure a substance by heft without apparatus; or the sense of how to position one’s body in relation to a material or tool.

As an internalized understanding of the actions and characters of tools and materials, embodied knowledge is intimately linked to material knowledge. Material knowledge is an understanding of the constraints, tendencies, and interior forces native to a substance and their respective responses to exterior objects or forces. Material knowledge often approaches objects as crystallizations of forces and flows within networks rather than static, self-contained artifacts. Embodied and material knowledge intersect in the use of tools.

Additional Resources:

Jennifer L. Roberts, “Things, Material Turn, Transnational Turn,”American Art 31.2 (Summer 2017): 64-69.

Michael Polanyi, “Skills,” in Personal Knowledge: Towards a Post-Critical Philosophy. Chicago: University of Chicago, 1962. pp. 49-65.